I am a telecom consultant and own Expense Recovery Group, a firm specializing in phone bill audits.  We have worked with hundreds of telecom companies and over the years have found AT&T to be one of the worst at customer service.

On several occasions we've brought client billing problems to AT&T's attention.  First of all it a chore to get to a live, breathing AT&T person who can actually assist you.  Secondly, once you win the argument to convince AT&T to resolve a billing problem it can take months and several phone calls to make sure credits or refunds were actually given by AT&T.  The time and energy one has to devote to the situation is absurd. AT&T bureaucracy is just too cumbersome.

Here's a case in point.  I'm working with a Idaho school district which is provided services under AT&T's state contracted rates.  I discovered four accounts billing at different rates when in reality all toll services should be billing under the same master contract.  After several phone calls and being directed to various AT&T representatives, I finally got to an individual responsible for the school district's contract.  She agreed that there should be one master contract and promises to close three of the accounts and migrate all services to the master contract.  Since the rates were billing at 200% to 300% higher than the contracted rate she agreed to re-rate and issue a credit.  She said not to make any additional payments to the closed accounts since a credit would be issued.  After two months and multiple phone calls and several voicemail messages left, I have not heard back from this individual.  In the meantime AT&T has sent the school district threatening letter for non-payment on the accounts that were to be closed.

This is a typical AT&T experience for us.

Jeff Blood, jblood@expenserecoverygroup.com